United Cutlery Releases The Vorthelok Sword by Designer Kit Rae

Fantasy Collectible Is Newest Addition to the Popular Swords of the Ancients Collection


ATLANTA, GA--(Marketwire - February 22, 2010) - Cutlery®, manufacturer of licensed edged and adult collectibles for the entertainment industry since 1981, today announced the release of the Vorthelok™, a new sword from the Sword of the Ancients™ collection by popular designer Kit Rae.

Beginning February 22, 2010, fans will have the opportunity to pre-order Kit Rae's Vorthelok™ from BUDK, a United Cutlery® dealer, for $119.99 plus shipping. The swords are scheduled to arrive for delivery March 25, 2010. For information on reserving the sword, visit Budk.com/vorthelok .

In 1997 Kit Rae created the highly successful Kit Rae Fantasy Art brand, a line of his unique collectible weapons with companion art prints of his fantasy paintings. Images from a hidden world of dreams and nightmares inspire this line of edged creations. Some of his designs are strikingly beautiful, some wickedly haunting, and some defy conventional description. Kit Rae's fantasy knives and swords spawned the creation of a huge collectible market worldwide for fantasy weapons that has generated numerous imitators. He is perhaps best known for his top-selling Swords of the Ancients™ collection, an ongoing line of medieval-inspired fantasy weapons that include a companion print of his fantasy artwork and a mythology about each weapon.

The latest in the Swords of the Ancients™ collection, the Vorthelok Autographed Edition features a 28" false-edged, stainless steel blade with serial number and laser-engraved runes, finely detailed cast metal hilt parts with "antiqued iron" metal finish, and a waxed cotton cord wrapped grip. The sword stretches 45" overall and includes a certificate of authenticity and custom art print hand autographed by Kit Rae.

The mythology behind the Vorthelok revolves around the evil Ancient One Evruc in the Fourth Age, who forged this powerful sword. Vorthelok was later enchanted by Evruc's brother Atnal and used against Evruc when he was cast out of the order of the Ancients. Wrought in the hand guard is the symbol of the watching eye of Evruc and the pommel is formed in the likeness of Evruc's terrible head. The blade features runes by Atnal that translate to "Out of Darkness Comes Light."

"Our successful partnership with Kit Rae is due in no small part to the level of detail and passion Kit brings by creating each sword," says Clint Kadel, CEO and owner of United Cutlery. "We are proud to add the Vorthelok to the Sword of the Ancients™ collection, and look forward to bringing new and exciting creations from Kit to United Cutlery."

"United Cutlery has been making my sword designs into reality for over twelve years now, but this time they have really outdone themselves," says Kit Rae. "This replica of my Vorthelok sword design is superb. The construction and level of detail is really second to none. I am really pleased with the finished piece, and I applaud United Cutlery for a great job!"

For more information and to browse all of Kit Rae's designs, visit budk.com/kitrae.

About United Cutlery®

With 28 years of branded experience, United Cutlery® continues to be the leader in producing top quality licensed collectibles. United Cutlery® strives to make knives and swords to the highest standards in the industry with superior materials and workmanship that are a step above the cheap imitations. In addition to Kit Rae® brand products, United Cutlery® is currently licensed to manufacture products for God of War®, Devil May Cry4®, GI Joe: Rise of Cobra, KISS®, Lynyrd Skynyrd®, The Lord of the Rings®, Highlander®, and Disney®'s Prince of Persia®.

About Kit Rae

Kit Rae is one of the foremost fantasy/collectible weapon designers in the industry. He was the lead designer for United Cutlery for over fifteen years, and his pieces have appeared in television shows such as Burn Notice, The X-Files, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and numerous films such as Spider Man 2. Kit has also created and supervised many licensed weapon replicas from films and television shows such as Prince of Persia, Blade, Blade Trinity, Hellboy, Total Recall, Mortal Kombat, Highlander, The Mask of Zorro, Heroes, and over fifty products for The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. Kit is also the replica design supervisor for many weapons from the video gaming industry. For United Cutlery, he created the Legends in Steel, Samurai 3000, Steel Apocalypse, Blades of Atlantis, and the Swords of the Ancients collections.

About BUDK®

BUDK® offers high-quality, direct-to-consumer swords, knives, medieval and fantasy weaponry, air guns, and other collectible weapons. BUDK® was founded by Clint Kadel over 20 years ago and has been a thriving success since. BUDK® distributes The BUDK Catalog and operates the www.budk.com website. For a free catalog or to view the entire BUDK® product selection, visit their website. BUDK is also on Facebook at Facebook.com/Budk and Twitter at Twitter.com/BudkCatalog.

Contact Information: Contact: Angela Singletary Gio Public Relations 612-309-2811

The Vorthelok Sword By Designer Kit Rae